Last Time I Make a Bet
by TheCatsTales
Summary: Prowl is sent to Earth for a recon mission, which goes badly wrong when he is attacked. Now he must rely on a rather strange human, who has a temper to rival Ratchet's, to repair him so he can return to his team. But nothing ever goes to plan...
1. Chapter 1

_A/N: I am one of those unusual people who became a fan of something because I enjoyed the fan fiction. I love the Transformers movies, but must confess to not really knowing much about anything else Tranformers related, so I apologise in advance for any mistakes made regarding characters, colours, personalities, or anything else - I'm trying to double check things I'm not sure about, but nobody is perfect ;)_

_This takes place in an alternate universe, where the _Ark _never crashed, and is instead going about it's business. Prowl, who was sent to Earth on a recon mission, ends up in trouble, and must be repaired by a human who has a temper to rival Ratchet's. Please R&R :)_

* * *

"I am never making a bet with Artemis again. Ever!"

This declaration was accompanied by a loud clang, as an angrily thrown wrench made contact with a filing cabinet that was currently serving as a tool box.

"I don't care what 'box of tricks' she has lined up, there is no way it is worth being trapped in this godforsaken hellhole. 'Fully furnished' my ass! Even the door needed repairing when I got here!" The angry rant continued, slightly muffled by the innards of the boiler that the ranting person was currently repairing.

"And that 'it would be too easy if everything was perfect' crap isn't going to work on me either. Not perfect is one thing, but having to evict a family of raccoons from inside the oven? And if I can't find a way to make those damn floorboards stop squeaking, it is going to drive me insane!" The ranting ceased as another metallic clang echoed through the garage, this one caused by the boiler casing being reattached to the newly repaired boiler.

"Well, _more_ insane, at any rate," continued the girl ruefully. "I'm pretty sure the first sign of madness is shouting at a room full of inanimate objects. The second sign is probably discussing your impending insanity with them."

With a sigh, the girl gathered up the tools she had been using and placed them neatly back into the filing cabinet-cum-toolbox, then headed into the tiny kitchen (that was now raccoon free, thankfully) to grab some food before she retreated into the cellar that was currently serving as a bedroom for the night.

Her last thought before she slipped into sleep, was that it was depressing when the only place in the house that was dry and warm enough to spend the night, was under three feet of concrete. This really was the last time she made a bet with Artemis.

Every inch of Prowl's body was in agony. What had been a simple reconnaissance mission, had quickly turned into a fight for his life when the Decepticon Seeker trine had ambushed him. Taken completely by surprise, and being completely out-numbered, he had eventually had to retreat, or risk being deactivated.

Or maybe flee would be a better choice of words, thought the exhausted Autobot. Retreat suggested that he had someplace to retreat to. Right now he was stranded in the middle of nowhere, unable to contact anyone, or even transform back into his bipedal mode.

He had picked up some severe injuries during the fight, damaging his comm. system, so all he got was static, and damaging something that interfered with his transforming process. He wasn't sure what he had damaged, all he knew was that if he tried to revert back to his bipedal shape, the process would get halfway and then he would experience blinding pain, which only receded when he stopped trying to transform. After one attempt that had resulted in a panicked moment during which he could neither complete the transformation, nor undo it, he had decided that it would be safer to remain in his police car alt mode for the time being.

To top it all off, he was still losing energon.

All the badly beaten 'bot wanted was somewhere sheltered where he could safely recharge for the night - the bigger problems could be confronted in the morning, when he wasn't so tired. Yet even in this simple desire, his luck seemed to be out; it had been over two hours seen he had last seen a building of any sort, and the last two he had passed had been in complete ruins.

Just as Prowl was starting to consider completely giving up on finding any shelter, he spotted the silhouette of a small building in the distance. After some debate, he decided to investigate. If it turned out to be another ruin, he could use it to at least help disguise the shape of his frame. Even if it didn't provide protection from the elements, it could prevent him being spotted by any passing Decepticon.

As he got closer, he saw that the building wasn't quite as wrecked as the others he had passed. It still had a roof, and appeared structurally sound, though it didn't seem to have been inhabited for some time; the smaller, human-sized door hung off it's hinges, while the garage door was lying in the grass several feet away from the frame it should be occupying. The lack of garage door was something of a benefit to Prowl; if there had been a door, he couldn't have opened it, and ramming it down, in his current condition, would probably have damaged him more than the door.

After running a quick scan that confirmed that the building contained no organic life forms - with the exception of a few rodents, and a family of small grey creatures that Prowl had never seen before, with distinctive eye markings and ringed tails, that seemed to be sneaking into the building - he slowly rolled forwards into the garage. A second scan, once he was in the garage, reassured him that it was safe for him to slip into recharge.


	2. Chapter 2

Finding out that the raccoon family had used the cover of the night to slip back into 'their' oven came as no great surprise. Finding out that someone had used the cover of the night to slip a police car into the garage was another matter entirely.

"What have you managed to get yourself into this time, B?" the girl muttered to herself as she circled the vehicle warily. Admittedly, Artemis was supposed to dropping a 'project' off for her, but this was fast even for Artemis.

Still, it _looked_ like something Artemis would build, and she was supposed to be sending something that she had built herself. The more B looked, the more reassured she was that it was something Artemis had sent, and not a real police car. Upon close inspection, the car had a few minor differences to real police cars. Plus, last time B had checked, police cars didn't leak bright pink glowing fluid.

"If this is it, this whole thing may end up being easy," B announced to the empty room. Suddenly motivated, she decided to skip breakfast, and get started on repairing the car as quickly as possible.

The first thing that needed to be done, was identifying the strange pink fluid that had dripped from the car, and now formed puddles on the garage floor. Being a highly impatient individual, B decided to do this by the most direct route possible: sticking her hand into it.

Several curses and thorough hand wash later, she returned wearing thick industrial gloves. Whatever the pink stuff was, it was corrosive and not designed for direct contact with the skin. Coming from Artemis, that could either mean it was utilised as a weapon, or it was a fuel source, but whichever it was, it needed to be handled carefully.

After a closer inspection of the car, she concluded that the fluid must be some sort of fuel. She may not be the world's best mechanic, but she could spot a weapons system a mile away, and this car didn't have one. The beginnings of one, maybe, but nothing that could be used without modification.

Having (sort of) identified the mystery fluid, B moved on to the second step of repairing the car: cleaning it so she could actually see what damage it had suffered. It was currently covered in a layer of mud and dust so thick that it made it hard to tell where the doorframe was, never mind cracks and scrapes on the bodywork.

Deciding to kill two birds with one stone, B attached the hosepipe to the hot tap (Artemis could foot the heating bill) of the industrial sink that sat in the corner of the garage. Unsure how the pink fuel would react to the water, B made sure to test it on one the smaller puddles near the door. When nothing happened, she washed down the rest of the floor.

Now that she could move around without worrying about splashing herself with corrosive fuel, she set about washing the car. Very gently, so as to avoid damaging anything further, she scraped away the muck, being sure to remove every last speck of dirt from even the tiniest of cracks and grooves. Although she had a reputation for being almost suicidally impatient at times, when she had a project, she was a perfectionist.

As she worked, she made a mental note of all the places the fuel was leaking from, and made temporary welds in spots that were leaking a lot. By the time she had finished, the car looked like it had just been dragged out of a war zone: the silver scars of the temporary welds standing out in stark contrast to the black and white paint of the car.

It already looked like a write-off, and she hadn't even looked at the engine yet. With a sigh, B set to work.

* * *

Prowl was in a much deeper recharge than normal. Rather than snapping out of recharge and being instantly alert as he usually would, he found himself drifting in and out of recharge, slowly becoming more aware of his surroundings as his various sensors began to come online.

The first sensation he became aware of was of something _rubbing_ him. Then he felt warm liquid running down his body, accompanied by a slightly rougher rubbing. Suddenly the liquid - water? - disappeared. The next thing he felt was a hot, stinging sensation as something sealed up one of his wounds. Had he been fully conscious, he would likely have yelped at the suddenness of the pain - which was quickly followed by the renewal of the water and rubbing - but as it was, all he could do was try to make his processor make sense of the fuzzy sensations.

Gradually, he became more aware of his surroundings and realised he was in a garage. That jolted his processor into finally dredging up the previous days events. He was in the abandoned garage he had taken refuge in last night. Except something had changed. The garage was no longer abandoned.

After a more careful scan of the garage, Prowl realised that the sensations he had felt while he was groggy, had been the human washing him. Quite thoroughly, he might add. The hot, stinging sensation had been the human welding his wounds shut. Now the human seemed to be glaring at his engine, muttering something about being given impossible tasks, and never making bets again.

While the human was around, Prowl would have to...what was the human phrase? 'play possum'. The idea of having a human poking around inside him, while he sat there and did nothing, was not very appealing, but the alternative - speaking and revealing what he was - was even worse.

Prowl didn't know exactly how the human would react to finding out that the automobile that she was currently working on was actually a transforming alien from a distant planet, but every scenario his battle computer ran through showed that it would end badly. The human Internet showed that, as a species, humans either reacted to aliens with a flat denial of their existence, or with hysteria, neither of which Prowl felt he was in any state to cope with. Not to mention the Decepticon attention it would attract.

So he remained completely still and silent as the human worked. Or at least, mostly still and silent. The occasional weld in a sensitive place made him grunt slightly, but he was sure that the human hadn't noticed. In fact, he would be amazed if she could hear anything at all over the sound of her own voice. By the fifth hard-to-reach weld, she was cursing up a storm and throwing tools across the room.

Bad tempers seemed to be a requirement for medics, Prowl noted with amusement.

* * *

By the time 3 o' clock rolled around, B was in a foul temper. The car was an absolute wreck that was constructed in the most convoluted way possible. If she didn't know better, she would swear it was trying to make itself impossible to fix. Every time she thought she had finally sealed all the cracks and scrapes that were leaking the pink fluid (which she had been splashed with numerous times throughout the day), she would find more hidden behind a cable that shouldn't even have existed. Then once she had finally finished for real, four of the welds decided to give way, meaning more welding for her, and more things being tossed across the room in a fit of temper.

To make matters worse, she was sure the car was making noises. At first she had thought she was imagining it, but when it had continued she had started to listen out for it. Sure enough, when she made welds in certain spots - on the doors being a major one - she would hear a muffled grunt. It was the sort of grunt she recognised too; she made a similar noise when she was getting stitches in a sore or sensitive place, and hadn't had it numbed first.

After hours of welding and re-welding, it was finally finished. All the welds were holding, and there was no more fluid leaking out of the car. B could finally have something to eat.

As she began to head into the kitchen, she suddenly remembered the raccoon family that had moved back in. With a shout of frustration, she hurled her gloves - the only thing she had left on hand - at the car, where they hit the bonnet, and slid down to the floor, where the came to rest in a pathetic little heap.

Still frustrated, B left to re-evict the raccoon family, and finally make some food.


	3. Chapter 3

The car had moved.

In the five minutes she had been gone, the car had moved.

When she had first returned to the garage, to get the gloves so she could move the raccoons without being bitten, she had done a double-take, sure she must be mistaken, but the car was definitely sitting at least a foot further back than it had been when she left it. Having been blessed - or in her opinion, more like cursed - with a photographic memory, she knew that the gloves, which were now sitting in a little heap near the front bumper, had been right next to the front wheel. There were also four lighter, drier patches of floor, where the wheels had been touching the ground while she washed the car.

B didn't move from her spot in the doorway. As tempting as it was to run over to the gaping hole in the wall that should have been the garage door, to see if there was anyone outside who could have moved the car, she knew that she would be able to tell just as easily from where she stood.

Wrapping her hands around the mug of coffee that she had been in the kitchen making, she very carefully scanned the room, looking for even the slightest disturbance. Four excruciatingly slow sweeps of the room confirmed that not a single item was out of place. Moving closer to the garage doorway, B examined the ground outside. Once she was sure nobody had come near the doorway, she walked into the middle of the room, and examined the ceiling, looking for possible, if unlikely entry routes into the building.

This is where B's real talent lay; identifying when, where and how someone could, or had broken into a building. If she was lucky, she got to play a more active role than just planning and observing, but after a recent flurry of arrests - all of which had come to naught - she had been sidelined until the police lost interest in her, which was why she had taken Artemis' bet in the first place.

After spending almost an hour examining every last inch of the room in the hope of finding evidence of a person, or group of people, B knew that there was absolutely no way anybody could have got into the room, moved the car, and got out again so cleanly in the five minutes she was in the kitchen. Even more disturbingly, a close examination of the ground outside had revealed that the only person to have been outside in the last two days, was her.

Normally, this would simply mean that whoever had brought the car was still around. In the run down shed of a building B was currently living in, however, there was no way someone could be living there without her knowing. The only other rooms besides the garage, were the little kitchen, which she had just been in, and it barely had space for one person to move, never mind hide; the basement, which was being used as her bedroom, and was locked up tight whenever she wasn't in there; and a bedroom that she had to walk through whenever she wanted to use the bathroom.

There was only one logical conclusion left.

The car was driving itself.

Having known Artemis for years, this in itself was not particularly strange. What was strange, and made her doubt that the car was Artemis' creation, were the noises the car had made. Everything Artemis made had a practical application, even if that application required some lateral thinking to understand. A police car that could drive itself had hundreds of potential uses; a car that grunted in pain when you were repairing it had no uses. There was no way that Artemis would waste the resources it would take to install the necessary sensors and programming.

The question of where the car had come from, and who it belonged to would have to be answered eventually, but right now it needed repairing. Artemis' car or not, if B could fix it she would still win the bet, and probably some extra brownie points for finding something like this.

It was several hours later, while she was underneath the car, repairing engine damage that could not be reached from above, that a sudden realisation crashed over her, nearly making her drop her wrench in shock.

The pained grunts that the car had given had been almost identical to the grunts she made when she was given stitches after a mission that had gone badly. The only time she made any noise during any kind of medical procedure, was when it hurt too much to not make a noise, and a muffled grunt or gasp escaped. If someone had programmed a car to grunt in discomfort, they would not have programmed it to make muffled, almost inaudible grunts as infrequently as possible. The way the car worked made no sense; nobody would programme it to act the way did.

To B, that left only one conclusion. The car wasn't programmed.

The car was _alive!_

For several minutes, she continued working methodically, allowing her brain time to digest this piece of news that it had spewed out fast enough to catch itself by surprise. As each minute slipped by, she found herself becoming more and more adjusted to the idea that the car she was working on was as alive as she was. This idea was aided greatly by B's past experiences: if something bizarre existed, it would somehow find its way to B, and do its very best to make its presence known. Sentient cars didn't even come close to being the weirdest thing she had ever come across.

Still, a theory will only ever be theory until you do something to prove it to be true. It was with this in mind that B used the wrench to give a particularly harsh twist and yank to a bundle of wires. No sentient creature would be able to have their internal system treated so roughly without responding in some way; self-preservation wouldn't allow it.

Sure enough, the car jolted and gave a yelp, closely followed by "Frag."

Success.

"So," said B in an accusatory tone, as she pulled herself out from under the car, "you _are_ alive." She stood before the car with her hands on her hips, wrench still clenched in one fist.

There was a moment of silence, which stretched on to become minutes.

"You've already given the game away. You can either talk now, or I can make you talk," she said warningly when she finally lost patience with the car's maintained silence.

"That I highly doubt," the car responded, irate. B grinned.

"Well, that's too bad, because I've already proved your doubts unfounded," she retorted, folding her arms.

"Oh? How so?" The car's tone was no longer irate. Now it sounded calm and patient. B, who had lived with a master of the 'zen face' (as she had taken to calling it) for years, wasn't fooled for a second. The car was just as irritated, angry and worried as it had been ten seconds ago.

"You're talking to me now. I've been in here all day, and you haven't said a word, so you obviously didn't _want_ to talk to me. You only said anything when I made you do so. Therefore, you doubts are based on nothing, because I have already done what you're doubting I could do." She paused for a moment, unsure how well the car could keep up.

"Anyway," she continued after a few seconds, "you're doubting me for nothing, so you have to tell me your name now."

The car hesitated for a moment, before making a noise that sounded startlingly like a sigh.

"Prowl."

"Well Prowl, I'm B, and you're not going anywhere fast. Why don't you explain who, and what you are, while I carry on trying to get you road worthy?"

The way that she grinned and twirled the wrench in her hand, while standing over a defenceless patient, reminded Prowl ominously of Ratchet.


End file.
